Vitamin D doesn't cut cancer risk, study says

WASHINGTON -- A large study found no sign that vitamin D lowers the overall risk of dying from cancer, injecting a note of caution to the latest vitamin craze.

WASHINGTON -- A large study found no sign that vitamin D lowers the overall risk of dying from cancer, injecting a note of caution to the latest vitamin craze.

The exception: People with more vitamin D in their blood did have a significantly lower risk of death from colorectal cancer, supporting earlier findings.

Getting enough of the so-called sunshine vitamin -- the skin makes it from ultraviolet rays -- is vital for strong bones.

But vitamin D has made headlines in recent years because of research saying it might be a powerful cancer fighter, sparking a push for people to get more than currently recommended amounts, either through diet or sun exposure.

The first-of-a-kind government study released yesterday shows the issue is far from settled.

National Cancer Institute researchers analyzed vitamin D levels measured in almost 17,000 people as part of a national study that tracked their health. About a decade after enrolling, 536 of those people had died of cancer.

Whether people had low or high vitamin D levels played no role in their risk of dying from cancer in general, they reported yesterday in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

Then the researchers examined different types of cancer. There were just 66 deaths from colorectal cancer.

"While vitamin D may well have multiple benefits beyond bone, health professionals and the public should not, in a rush to judgment, assume that vitamin D is a magic bullet and consume high amounts," Johanna Dwyer, a dietary supplement specialist at the National Institutes of Health, cautioned in an accompanying editorial.

Scientists have been interested in vitamin D's effects for decades, since noticing that cancer rates between similar groups of people were lower in sunny southern latitudes than in northern ones.